I would just like to say hello to everyone here. If you don't know me, I don't know you all.
I'm past three at Tabernacle. I'm past the Storm Town Baptist Church.
We just have started up in the South End on CNS 6 in the UK.
This is actually my second time in South Africa. I'm on the third time preaching.
Many of you have been thinking of preaching to Tabernacle, many of you have been here.
It's a little bit hot today, but you know you've got to take a look at this.
We were at a church in the UK. It's actually only close to a few years ago when we came.
I attended a church just back in August.
So yeah, we were pretty much one of these fine guys there in the UK.
We feel like we're doing great things right now.
We're just in the UK when we come here. It's about to sound like the world to us.
We're a secret school here around the world.
But I'd like you to, well just a quote to you actually.
I would like to say a couple of things as well.
One of which is especially about the school, which is we'll be organizing.
I've organized marathons. I think we'll be organizing missions here.
I'll tell you why this is a lot of work.
I reckon school's framework must be pretty interesting.
He's been working really hard for this.
We appreciate everything you've done for this program. It's been great.
Sometimes a lot of organizing with these things goes down notice.
You just turn up. There's so much stuff that goes on to organize things.
So thank you for your hard work with this.
I think for the hospitality as well.
We've got some great food so far. We've got some great times.
Hopefully we can have a great week with you all around the school.
Thank you very much.
Thank you everyone here as well.
Thank you everyone who's made your trip out here.
Whether you've come from, well it's still a trip from Cape Town.
I think the longest journey actually was probably from Pretoria.
And second, Johannesburg.
Because it sounds like that's a long journey.
About 18 hours from his family.
But yeah, as well, you know, you'll see a lot of laughter.
You'll see some great food as well.
Switzerland.
Father Hu coming with me over from the UK as well.
You know, it's a big bit of travels and distances.
And it's great.
We've seen loads of people saved and it's been some great times so far.
So thank you to everyone.
Thank you very much for being here to listen to me preach this message.
Which I'll be thinking about before I take over and start thinking about this message.
I'd like to preach to you tonight.
So I want you to look down at Matthew chapter 4 where you are from verse 17.
We're just going to read a few verses again then.
From verse 17.
Which reads,
From that time Jesus began to preach and say,
Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.
And Jesus walking by to see a Galilee saw two brethren.
Simon called Peter and Andrew and his brother casting a net in the sea,
for they were fishers.
And he said unto them, Follow me, and I will make you fishers and men.
And they strayed away and left their nets and followed him.
And going on from thence he saw two of his brothers who met with James,
the son of Zebedee.
And John his brother in a ship with Zebedee, their father,
leaving their nets and he called them.
And they immediately left the ship and their father followed him.
And the part of my sermon today is how to be a great fisherman.
How to be a great fisherman.
I'd like to pray before we continue with this message.
Father, thank you for your work.
Thank you very much.
Thank you for this great mission.
Thank you for all the souls that have been saved.
I pray now that you just fill in this room with all the evidence
which is boldly and accurately and clearly.
Help everyone here for a particular reason.
Have a note of the mark.
Send the message to people who have your heart, heart, and the Lord.
And let them receive it in a way that it's meant, Lord.
And just help everyone here to just then therefore go forward
and think about this message and try and write their lives.
In Jesus' name, amen.
Amen.
Okay, so when it comes to soul meeting,
soul meeting is talking about, when we say soul meeting,
we're talking about no happening in souls of the Lord.
When we talk about soul meeting, the Lord Jesus Christ gives us
a few different types of occupations to compare soul meeting to,
which he uses to picture soul meeting.
One, he uses farming.
He uses farming.
He talks about soul meeting, for example.
He talks about the harvest, reaping the harvest.
It's an occupation which helps us to give us pictures and likenesses
to what we call soul meeting, when it's souls for the Lord.
Another one is healthcare.
Jesus Christ being a great physician.
He talks about being a holy, not a physician,
but being a sick, senior people.
He uses a lot of these pictures of the same people's souls.
And then another one, he's fishing.
And here we're going to see him talking about fishing here,
and he's to give us a picture and a likeness to save his souls.
In verse 19, it says, and he says unto them,
Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.
When it comes to fishing, when it comes to successful fishing,
you need to know what you're doing, right?
I don't know if any of you guys have ever done any sort of amateur hobby fishing
or anything like that.
I have been really in it.
You know what, if I try to get in with the Lord in it,
I'll probably get tangled up.
I'll probably end up picking up over the side
and then hiding on those gray whites over here or something.
But you've got to know what you're doing to do some fishing.
That's hobby fishing.
Can you imagine commercial fishing?
You're actually trying to get fish to be your livelihood, right?
You better have an idea of what you're doing, right?
Or let's be honest, you don't just get in a boat
and then come back with 153 fish.
You know, we're still here in the North Sea, Boston and Jordan.
You don't just get in a boat and come back,
but then you sort of catch the fish.
Let us know what you're doing.
You're probably more likely not to come back.
You're probably more likely in some of these seas
and some of these areas and some of these winds
and other things like that,
probably to never come back at all.
You need to know what you're doing, right?
Well, it's like that with sovereignty.
If you want to be successful, you need some help.
You need some instruction, but you might not come back.
You might not come back from sovereignty.
You might not come back from any of those sovereignty,
but you need to know what you're doing, right?
And do you know what South Africa, like everywhere else, needs?
It needs more fishermen.
South Africa needs some more fishermen, right?
It needs more fishermen.
And you might say, well, we've done our way,
but we've had a good catch.
I think we had 50-some say,
yesterday I don't know how many we've got saved today.
It's probably more than that.
But what the old saying goes,
there are plenty more fish in the sea.
There are plenty more fish in the sea.
There's plenty more fish that have been catching out there.
And in this passage, there are some great lessons
that help us become great fishermen.
I hope that if you're saved, if you're sitting here today,
you want to be a great fisherman.
And then when we talk about fish,
we're going to talk about saving souls,
catching fish for the Lord.
You need to be a great fisherman.
You need to get over the seasickness.
You need to get over the wind.
You need to get over the pirates trying to steal our fish.
There's a lot of pirates out there trying to steal our fish.
You need to be able to defeat those.
You need to be able to get those fish,
get them into the boat, right?
How to be a great fisherman is the title of the day.
Point number one is that fishing isn't automatic.
Did you know that?
Fishing is not automatic.
In Matthew 4, following his baptism,
Jesus has been famously tempted by the devil in the wilderness,
as we heard Greg at my father's school earlier.
He then travels up to Topolium,
which is a town on the north coast of the Sea of Galilee,
which is like a huge lake around, I would say,
it seems to be about an 80-mile journey from Jerusalem,
north of Jerusalem.
It says in verse 17,
From that time Jesus began to preach,
and she said,
The pleasure of your sins, but it is but heaven is at hand.
He didn't say that, did he?
Did he say that?
No.
A lot of people think he said that.
It doesn't matter if he's going to say that.
Everybody must say that,
because they've been told the whole life of your sin.
He did say that, didn't he?
He said, Repent!
Repent!
For the kingdom of heaven is at hand.
The same repentance that God didn't call anyone else in the Bible.
The changing of mind.
The same repentance that God did.
And I don't know about you, but I believe that God can't sin.
He's incapable of sinning.
So, we don't have to be, obviously.
It's obviously the word of repentance.
But let's just, we've cleared that up, hopefully.
But keep on being here in John 3.
This is the same Jesus that said in John 3.
For God so loved the world that He gave His only God, Son,
and Whosoever believeth in Him should not pay for an everlasting life.
And here he began to preach the same repentance
that John the Baptist had been preaching.
So in Acts chapter 19 and verse 4,
Paul explains this repentance,
in case anybody's confused about this.
He says in Acts 19 and verse 4,
then said Paul,
John bearing the baptism and repentance,
saying unto the people
that they should believe on him which shall come after them,
that is, on Christ Jesus.
So what repentance was John preaching?
A change of mind to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. Right?
Right. Amen.
Go back to Matthew 4 with that in mind.
John was a saved man and God preached a saved everlasting gospel
that has saved men all the way through the Bible from as early as Genesis.
So although there would have been no satanic God saved,
like those made in Acts 19,
John's disciples on the whole were saved men of God.
John's disciples were saved men of God.
And look at verse 18.
It says that Jesus walking by the sea at Galilee
saw two brethren,
Simon called Peter and Andrew his brother,
casting a net into the sea,
for they were fishers,
and he said unto them,
Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.
That's exactly what Simon, Peter and Andrew were.
They were saved men.
This wasn't their salvation moment.
Follow me is not the gospel.
The gospel is believe in the Lord Jesus Christ.
So unless we were talking about following him to eternal life,
no, but he's not.
Because if you turn to John chapter 1,
we're going to see that they were already saved.
These were already saved men of God.
John chapter 1,
we see the first find that Andrew and Peter meet Jesus.
John chapter 1 and from verse 35 it says again,
John 1,
the gospel of John chapter 1 and verse 35 says again,
the next day after John stood and two of his disciples.
Now this is John the Baptist and his two disciples.
And considering what John was preaching,
his disciples should be saved, shouldn't they?
Their disciples said, John, they should be saved.
And looking upon Jesus as he walked,
he said, Behold the Lamb of God.
And the two disciples heard him speak and they followed Jesus.
Then Jesus turned and saw their following
and said unto them, What seek ye?
They said unto their rabbi,
which is to say, be it an interpretive master,
where your brother's at.
So they're following him,
they're calling him master,
they want to be near him, right?
But as such, knowing he saith unto them,
come and see you.
They came and saw the way he dwelt
and the moment came that day,
for it was about the tenth hour.
One of the two which heard John speak and followed him
was Andrew, Simon Peter's brother.
So Andrew, who we just saw before 18,
is one of his two disciples of John's.
He's following Jesus, calling him rabbi.
He's abiding with him.
Verse 41 says, He first findeth his own brother Simon
and saith unto him, We have found the Messiah
which is being interpreted the Christ.
Now I think we can safely assume that Andrew is saved, right?
Okay, I hope you're looking down that guy Andrew
to say, May God.
Verse 41 says, He so believed that Jesus Christ
is born of God and had one that loveth him,
that begat loveth him also, that is,
but not adopt him.
Okay, he believed Jesus was a Christ, right?
Verse 42, where he was says, He brought him to Jesus
and when Jesus beheld him, he said, Thou art Simon,
the son of Jonah, thou shalt be called Cephas,
which is, by interpretation, a stone.
So he brings his brother to Jesus
and if Simon wasn't already saved,
this is a great vision of someone being brought to Christ,
isn't it?
He's being brought to Christ by a saint man of God.
Now that was John chapter one.
Go forward to chapter three.
We just read earlier in Matthew four verse 12,
now when Jesus had heard that John was passed into prison,
he departed into Galilee
when he had heard that John was passed into prison, yeah?
Well, in John's Gospel, we just had these events
in chapter one I've just read.
Then it's the wedding feast and the Passover in chapter two.
Nicodemus we see in chapter three,
the famous dialogue with Nicodemus,
and then it says this in chapter three and verse 22.
After, notice the word, after these things,
came Jesus and his disciples into the land of Judea
and there he tarried with them and baptised
and John also was baptising in Aenon there to save him
because there was much water there
and they came and were baptised.
So Jesus summoned his disciples
in one place to do baptism,
John stood still doing baptisms in another
and then look at verse 24,
for John was not yet cast into prison.
He was not yet cast into prison.
At this point in John chapter three,
long after he's already, we've seen Andrew and Peter
clearly saved, right?
They're saved by the God.
Well, go back to Matthew 4 and verse 12,
which says, when we started,
and keep in mind we're going to be in Matthew 4 the whole time,
which said, now when Jesus had heard
that John was cast into prison,
he departed into Galilee.
So this is after this point now.
Agreed?
You can see that, right?
So all of what we just read in John's Gospel
happened before Jesus goes to Galilee
to find Simon, Peter, and Andrew,
and I keep pointing,
and I say all that,
you know, what's the point in all that?
I say all that because there's a lot
of horsebumps out there
that say you've got to follow Jesus Christ,
and he's saved.
Even though we're already saved.
They're saved,
they're now a bit told to follow him.
And it said this,
in verse 18,
Jesus walked by to see a Galilee,
saw two brethren,
Simon called Peter and Andrew,
and the father cast their neck into the sea,
for they were fishers,
and he said unto them,
Follow me, and I will make the fishers of men.
So these previous disciples of John and Baptist
would already come to Jesus,
and now being told,
Follow me, and I will make the fishers of men.
Because getting saved
doesn't make you a successful soldier.
It doesn't.
It's not automatic.
Just because you're saved,
you're not going to go out and get other people saved.
Or if anyone out there is wondering,
and thinks it's just an automatic,
sinless perfection,
that's a load of old nonsense.
Okay?
A load of old nonsense.
Getting saved doesn't make you a disciple.
Turn to John chapter 8.
Getting saved does not make you a disciple.
Let's get that clear.
You can get saved and never be a disciple.
One of the most subtle angles of work salvation
is to combine discipleship with salvation.
This is a cod.
It's a lion here.
You've got to make him lord of your life.
You might have heard that one.
Or if you believe,
then the works will follow.
That's a common one.
And that's backdoorly work salvation.
If you believe,
the works might not follow necessarily.
You want them to follow.
You should make them follow.
It's got nothing to do with salvation.
And many people get saved,
and the works never follow.
And let's have a look down at Romans 8.
Before we do,
I want to just quote you Romans 4.5,
which says,
But to him the worketh not,
but believeth on him that justifieth the elderly.
His faith is good for righteousness.
No worketh the Lord,
but you've built your faith
in Christ Jesus Christ the same.
Galatians 2 16 says,
Knowing that the man is not justified
by the works of the Lord,
is not the faith of Jesus Christ.
Even when you believe in Jesus Christ,
you might be justified by the faith of the Lord,
and not by the works of the Lord,
for by the works of the Lord
shall none of us be justified.
No one is justified by the works of the Lord.
It's faith alone that saves not works.
And Jesus said in John 6, 47,
very, very, I said to you,
he did it for me after the last time.
It's faith that only Christ does not save you.
And in John 8,
Jesus is speaking to a mixture of Jews,
and some get saved.
It says in verse 30,
as he spake these words,
many believed on him.
What must I let you be saved?
The Lord Jesus Christ shall not save you.
No house.
So they're saved, aren't they?
Yeah.
Yeah, many believed on him.
Agreed?
Right.
Anyone think these people were saved?
Good.
We'll let you say it in the rest of the video.
Okay, then verse 31 says,
Then said Jesus to those Jews
which believed on him,
so we're going to say been him,
if, notice that word,
if ye continue in my word,
then it ye my disciples indeed.
If, if ye continue in my word,
then it ye my disciples indeed,
and ye shall know the truth,
and the truth shall make you free.
They're saved,
they have them in the last life,
but what would make them a disciple?
Do you hear this word?
It's not automatic.
They have a choice.
You have a choice.
You're saved.
You want to continue in his word,
or not?
You've got nothing to do with that in heaven.
Nothing to do with it.
You were saved when you believed on the Lord Jesus Christ,
but do you want to be this disciple?
I hope you want to be this disciple as well,
but it's separate salvation,
and it's what helps free us from the entanglement,
from the physical changes,
from the cares of this world,
you shall know the truth,
and the truth shall make you free.
The truth is the word of God.
And what is your most important job as a disciple?
Anyone?
What's your most important job as a disciple?
Is it turning up on a Sunday and hanging out
each other on the back?
It's only you, isn't it?
It's only you.
It's the only way people get saved
is you going out and reaching the gospel.
On second Friday,
people think they're just great Christians.
They're only so holy.
We're so spiritualized.
That's so good.
They are so kind and friendly and everything.
You can't even go to the same.
You can't even go and learn how to get someone saved.
You ain't a disciple.
You're a disciple when you're setting your heart
on trying to learn how to get people saved.
You're trying to get people to learn how to get saved.
You're trying to learn how to get people to learn how to get saved.
It's the first words.
There are so many apathetic pieces out here
that they've never even bothered to think about.
How might I one day learn how to get people to learn how to get saved?
And if your side of the party is great,
you're half a team.
You're a soldier.
Seriously, you come along.
You make up a half a bet.
If you make it great, you're half a team.
You've just made another half a team.
You're a soldier.
And if you're shy,
you know this is going to happen.
Come be a side of the party and support someone else at last.
That is your job.
That makes you.
That's part of what makes a disciple.
2 Corinthians 4.
He says,
Well, if our gospel be hid,
it is hid for them that are lost.
It's hid.
Oh, no, no, no.
Jesus will talk to him in a drink.
Oh, no, no.
He'll light up a billboard
and say,
Come to me.
No, he won't.
You ever speak to those people that are not saved?
Do you even know how to get saved?
No.
Do you get saved by letting God preach you the gospel?
That's the only way you ever got.
Anyone here who thinks that they got saved
without someone preaching the gospel,
you're a liar.
You ain't saved.
Someone preaching the gospel.
Oh, you didn't read the Bible and go,
Now I know.
I worked it out.
You can't.
The natural man received it not.
Those things have disappeared.
God, for their foolishness, unto him.
Neither can he.
No one can possess spiritual discernment.
I could not get saved until someone preached me the gospel.
Therefore, if you're saved,
Wow.
What a responsibility we have.
What's an effort?
After an effortless salvation.
Salvation is effortless.
It all has to do with belief.
Great Amen.
But you know what ran out fishing?
It's a hot job.
Verse 18, where you are,
I think you are,
back in Matthew 4, it says,
In Jesus, walking by the sea of Galilees,
saw two brethren,
Simon called Peter and Adam,
who had quite a class in ethics to see if they were fishers.
So he sees these same two same brothers going about their day to day work.
And he says,
Then follow me,
and I will make you fishers of men.
How do they make fishermen?
Number one, fishing is an automatic.
Number two, fishing requires effort.
Fishing requires effort.
Getting saved is easy following Jesus' eyes.
For a warning,
but it requires effort.
It really does.
Look, God isn't getting people saved that easy, right?
Look,
today you might have thought,
it sometimes feels quite easy, right?
I mean, you're almost like,
how do you do it right sometimes?
You're like,
just another person wants it.
They don't want to hear what the other person sees, right?
It's always like that.
And you know what?
Even with that,
it can be hard work.
It's hot.
It can sometimes,
sometimes it's hot.
Sometimes it's hot.
You're pounding the strings.
Sometimes you can spiritually find work.
You can preach to the gospel.
You can preach to one person.
You can preach to another.
It's hard work.
Even getting out there in the first place.
Some of the chapel,
the people are going to come here
and the first place goes to all of them today.
But it's worth it.
He said,
follow me.
That requires some action,
a lot of partners in it.
Following someone requires action.
Turn to Proverbs 13.
If you want to succeed in any pursuit of life,
you need to put effort in,
don't you?
Proverbs 13,
you're turning to,
and verse 4.
Proverbs 13,
verse 4 says this,
The soul of the sluggard desireth,
and hath nothing,
but the soul of the diligent,
shall be made bad.
No, it's not talking about anyone.
Okay?
Okay, you will gain,
you will gain if you put effort,
if you put work,
diligence.
Diligence is steady application for business,
constant in effort for exertion,
for accomplishment is undertaken,
insidious, attentive,
industrious,
not idle or negligent.
Don't be under-negligent
when it comes to people's souls.
Don't be a sluggard.
You may not short-life your life,
it's just a lame life.
It really is.
And as you get older,
you've got such a small amount of time,
you can be doing something worthwhile,
you can be done as saving people from hell,
or you can just get mixed up in the desert
as well.
It's the sequel,
this is the riches,
the lusts of other things entering in,
and all that,
which is the jungle.
Don't be under-negligent when it comes to people's souls.
It's physically taxing,
it's sometimes dangerous.
I can imagine it's pretty dangerous.
If you get good at the jungle,
it requires some diligence.
It's an effort.
How does that look for the soul-winner?
Well, it's putting time and effort into soul-winning, right?
You might not get up early to knock doors,
you might not be that appreciative.
Maybe you don't know how to find air knocking doors.
You might not get anyone's say.
But if you're up early,
you can at least sharpen your equipment.
You can get other things done
and make sure that you're therefore able to go later
or go at whatever set time.
You're able to go soul-winning if you're in a church
which has soul-winning times.
Get up early in the morning,
get everything else done
and make sure you're able to go soul-winning, right?
You need to put some effort in.
You need to go again in all weathers.
It's not always 40 degrees like this.
Sometimes I know when we're soul-winning
it can be freezing cold,
raining all day, hammering it down.
But you need to put some effort in.
You need to soul-winning in all weathers.
A friend of mine,
once told my wife this,
he said,
there's no such thing as it being too cold.
It's just being in your pocket with your dress.
You just have a dress to wear if you can't, right?
Now I don't know how it works for the heat.
Maybe it's just not having a good enough bag.
But it can be a lot of garlic, right?
But you can make it, okay?
It means growing up when you're tired.
It means growing up when you've had a long day.
That's putting effort in, right?
It means keep growing when you're spiritually exhausted
and I don't know,
I feel quite exhausted today.
Some of you probably did as well, right?
It means just keep going.
You keep going, right?
You keep going.
You keep solving.
You keep putting effort in.
And it means sometimes,
I'm telling myself,
I don't need to say this around.
Sometimes you're looking at these mates
and they think,
ooh, that could be a bit rough in there, right?
But you know,
when you look at the specimen
and some of those fishermen,
I'm sure that some days it is pretty dangerous, right?
When it's choppy out there,
when the wind's coming in and everything else.
But it's worth it, isn't it?
Right.
We're fishing, right?
We're not just fishing fish.
We need salt to escape.
What a job.
What a responsibility, right?
Turn over to chapter 9.
We're not like those sports fishermen
that put their straight back.
Oh, we're not like those limes.
I'm thinking like the kind of course viable limes.
You know what I mean?
They can't.
They get the fish,
but they don't actually do anything with it.
You know what I mean?
It's rich below the monsters.
We're not like the hunter
that's maybe just about to cook them on a barbecue.
They're not very well known.
I think we're all kind of fish, right?
But here's the thing.
Really, they're making like little squabbles.
They just stay out there
just trying to get the fish to cook them.
They're going to cook them forever, right?
They're going to toil with them.
We're rescuing those little fishes
from the fish farm
and putting them in a ton of lotion.
This is kind, generous fishing, right?
We're getting those little fishes
and then we're putting them somewhere nice.
And it's in a ton of lotion equipment.
And that requires,
and it requires a lot of time
to put the good guy in this passage from verse 57.
It says,
And it came to pass, Luke 9, 57,
as they went in the way,
a certain man said unto them,
Lord, I will follow thee with us,
so ever thou goest.
He said to them,
I don't follow you, right?
And Jesus said unto them,
Lord, the most of thee I have blessed,
but the Son of man,
and I have not quite a name, he said.
And he said unto them,
Another, follow thee.
But he said,
Lord, suffer me,
first of God,
and bury my father.
Jesus said unto them,
Let the dead bury their dead,
and come down,
and fix the kingdom of God.
And another also said,
Lord, I will follow thee,
but let them first,
and I will bid them farewell,
which I am at my house.
And Jesus said unto him,
No man,
having put his hand to the flower,
and looking back,
is fit for the kingdom of God.
You know what he's saying?
He's saying,
if you want to follow me,
you better get your blood.
You want to follow the Lord Jesus Christ
and get your blood straight,
you better have your focus right.
If you really want to follow Jesus
and be a great son with her,
you've got to focus on
fixing the kingdom of God.
You've got to have that many.
You've got to be many
to take the life away from you.
You've got to focus on
fixing the kingdom of God.
You've got to have that many.
You've got to be ready
to take those opportunities,
ready to fix them.
Sometimes,
what we're sold for anyway,
we're sold,
sometimes in England,
someone said to me,
you can go somewhere
and work today,
and get someone saved.
And you can be going regularly,
you can be doing hours and hours
each week,
and sometimes,
you ain't going to get the salvation
for a long time,
but you're prepared.
And then when that person
just out of nowhere
just is nearby you,
someone in the workplace,
something else,
you're just ready to just go away.
Do you want to know
how easy it is to get saved?
You've got to focus on
what happened in God today.
You're in tune,
you've got your heart set on the gospel,
you're not focusing on
all the other stuff, right?
You've got to focus on
how you're prepared
to make some sacrifices
is what that person is saying.
But following Jesus
isn't just about solving it.
People think we're in Luke 9
and go back to Matthew 4.
People think we're in Luke 9
and we all be coming back,
and we go back to Matthew 4
and verse 9,
Jesus said,
and he said unto them,
Follow me,
and I will make you
visions of men
out of you,
and I will make you
visions of men
out of you,
and I will make you
visions of men
the army of grace
tip fishes,
number one fishing
isn't automatic,
number two fishing
requires effort.
And number three,
fishing takes training.
Fishing takes training.
What do I mean by training?
I mean constant solving.
Well, you need to be
regular, for sure.
You want to be
a great fisherman,
you need to be
regular and solve it.
You need to just
find a way
that it makes
you sure you solvable.
That is what it is.
resting.
And, look,
you can do
two times, three times,
maybe even better.
The reality of it
is most people
you know, employed as some sort of a manager.
The pastor will find it hard, because there's so much other work that you're doing as well,
to start down five, six months a week.
Okay, you need to be just regular.
Make sure you're solving everything we have, right?
You need to be regular.
But when it comes to solving training,
and of course, you need to make sure you're doing things the right way.
You need to make sure that you're showing people what they need to know, right?
Okay, as we said, people need to know,
let's quickly remind everyone here before we do the rest of this weekend,
they need to know that they're sinners.
They need to know they're on the way to hell.
Not, well, yeah, some people go to hell for sin, you know, but,
I don't know, what have we done?
I just ask people, before I get anyone to pray for me,
they'd better have told me that definitely had I not preached in the Gospel,
they were going to pray for me, right?
If they don't tell me they were going to hell, I don't want to pray for them.
They go, well, I don't know.
Well, why do I pray for them first?
Because a lot of people will go, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, sit next to them, yeah, yeah.
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, pray all that.
And they really accept too many for saving.
They'd better understand that they're on their way to hell.
They'd better understand that Jesus is the Son of God.
They'd better understand that he died because they'd rather get paid for all their sins.
They'd better understand that the only thing you have to do to be saved
is to put your faith and trust in Jesus Christ alone.
And they'd better understand that once they've done that,
there is no way they can lose their salvation.
No way at all.
Not, well, as an honest, I still believe, no, you've got to save.
You've got to save.
If you did this in the future, would you still go to hell?
Now, they understand by the end of your presentation
that there is no way that you've got to hell.
They're not saying.
Why would you pray for someone who thinks that they can still lose their salvation?
Why would you pray for someone who thinks that they can still, you know,
they've got to go back to their sins and they can't do any of that?
You're not sure.
You don't get into that.
You can't be assured that there are people where you're like, I'm not sure.
But if they say everything right and you've kind of done what you can,
then I'm going to pray with them.
But if they're saying anything weird, anything funky,
I need to get that right.
Then you need to get to call the name of the Lord.
Don't get pulled into all that nonsense out there.
You don't have to ask Jesus Christ alone.
Who doesn't ask for salvation?
Who doesn't call on the name of the Lord for salvation?
That's just an attack on your muscle.
They need to call the name of the Lord.
So with that out of the way, there's some training that needs to go into that.
However, when we talk about training, it's not just specific, it's only training.
So you do need to know what you're doing.
Think about sports.
To be a great footballer requires more than just kicking the wall, doesn't it?
You need to be bummed.
You need to be doing long runs, short runs, sprint work, agility work, strength work.
You want to be a great footballer even if it's frustrating, right?
And that's pretty much in any sport, isn't it?
You ain't going to make it in sport if you just go,
I might get a bug, so that's what you need to do some boss training.
You need to be a world rounder.
In a workplace, a good boss might train you in various skills
that complement your workflow, won't they?
Maybe team skills, customer service skills,
other things that will help you in the long run with your job, right?
A good fisherman needs to be strong, fit, resilient.
He needs to be patient, he needs knowledge, he needs wisdom.
He needs to be a good swimmer.
He needs to have a good life jacket if he's not.
Well, when Jesus said to Simon,
Peter and Aaron should follow him, he didn't just mean outsold him.
He didn't say follow my soul with him.
The result of following Jesus will be a soul winner,
but there's more to following than soul winning.
Let me say that again, the result of following Jesus,
if you follow him, you will be a soul winner.
But there's more to following than soul winning.
To be a great soul winner, you need to be the full package.
You need to follow Christ in all their ways.
You really do. You want to be a great soul winner,
you better be a great disciple.
And he said unto them, follow me,
then I will make you vicious again.
A great soul winner will also meet their Bible.
They'll also have a strong prayer line.
They'll be a solid church member.
They'll be striving to get sin out of their life.
You will never be a long term great soul winner
if you are still battling with big sins in your life.
You'll never be a great soul winner.
We're all sinners. We're all going to sin.
But if you're still dealing with the booze,
you're still dealing with the fornication,
you're dealing with whatever that stuff is,
you will never be a great soul winner.
That stuff will choke you, it will tangle you,
you will never make it in the long run.
Amen.
A great soul winner.
If you start stroking off in other areas,
it will affect your soul.
Seriously.
If you start missing out on church,
you start skipping church, you start skipping prayers,
you are now and again up here in a prayer to God,
you start skipping your Bible reading,
you will fail in it.
You will never be a Lord ever great soul winner tonight.
No absolute night.
I've lost count of the amount of long church-going
soul winners in Toronto.
Honestly.
We didn't even have a good church to youth.
They're everywhere.
They're definitely not that bad of a church.
In hindsight, a lot of them are pretty fantastic.
But look, there are people who just find any excuse
not to go to church.
And do you know where half of those people are now?
In the wilderness.
I don't know where they are.
And there are people that will come to us now and again
and ask, is there someone here between?
Where are they now?
I don't see them anymore.
And I don't see someone here anymore.
You've got to be the full package.
You've got to be a great fisherman.
You need to be the full package.
Amen.
You need to be the full package.
There are a lot of carbon types that drop off as well.
There are people that come to our church, but you know
they're dealing with some pretty common stuff in their life.
And you know what?
If they don't deal with it fairly soon,
they just start to drop off.
And you can't make it in the long run.
See, this is one thing, but you need to keep training your
legs.
I'm not telling you long.
I'm not saying tell somebody you're doing something
about all these issues in your life.
What I'm saying is you need to get all those issues
sorted as well.
Keep solving it, but get your life right.
You want to be a great soul winner.
I hope everyone here.
If you're safe, you should be thinking, yeah, I want to be
a great soul.
I want to be a great fisherman.
Because that is the obvious job.
Without soul winning, I say you ain't a disciple.
Amen.
He said, follow me and I will make you fishers of men.
Luke 9, where you were.
Luke 9 and verse 23.
Luke 9 and 23 says,
And he said unto them, and he said to them all,
If any man will come after me,
let him deny himself and take up his cross daily,
and follow me.
It's a daily thing as well.
It's not, oh, well, I've got some sin out of my life.
That's it, I made it.
I'm a soul winner for life, baby.
Well, no, it's denying the flesh daily.
It's being in the things of God daily.
A great soul winner is a great church man.
Always working hard for a church.
If you don't have a church and you can't get near a church,
you better be working hard to get there.
When I say working hard, I mean soul winning.
I mean, get together with people and get soul winning.
You haven't got a church, get soul winning.
Meet people, get soul winning, and you'll get a church.
A great soul winner is also a great Bible reader.
Seriously.
The ones who last in the long run, they know their Bibles.
A great soul winner is also a great prayer warrior.
They're praying, they're going to the Lord,
because the thing you want, sometimes when I'm soul winning,
I'm praying to God in the middle of the term, which is gospel.
If you get to that point where you're like,
look, this is God, I'm having trouble here.
You need to be ready for this prayer.
Prayer needs to be a trigger thing.
If you want to be a great soul winner,
you want to do all those hard things,
but if you want to be a great son of God,
you need to be ready to pray, right?
A great soul winner also has great integrity,
because people can tell when you're a bitch.
They can tell when you're a bit of a sleep.
They can tell when you're a bit of a stomach.
They can tell when you're really trying to calm them a little bit.
You're trying to manipulate them or anything else.
A great soul winner has integrity,
and with all of that, a great soul winner has boldness.
You want to get people saved, you need to be bold, right?
There's a difference when you walk up to someone,
and boldness is the Holy Ghost,
and they say, let me show you what I mean to them.
There's a big difference in that.
If you don't mind,
I'm going to get that from you.
I want to hear someone say,
I know the truth, let me show you.
You need boldness, and that comes from all those other things,
because it comes from the Holy Spirit ultimately,
and you need to be led by the Spirit.
You need to be led by the Spirit to those people.
You need to be led by the Spirit to God,
and God to those people.
To go to that group of people, to go to those,
that's how you become a great soul winner
is by being uncomfortable.
It takes training,
but the training sessions aren't restricted.
They're not just restricted to certain people.
This is unlikely to be explored.
Let me show you something.
1 Corinthians says,
and instead of coming to them,
we have to follow.
Follow me, and I will make you fish to them.
I'm going to be a great fisherman.
Number one, fishing is an automatic.
Number two, fishing requires effort.
Number three, fishing takes training.
And number four, fishing is available to all.
Available to all.
1 Corinthians says,
and instead of coming to them,
follow me, and you may have what it takes
to be fishers of men.
Did he say that? No.
He didn't say follow me
if you have to get through the gap
to make you fishers of men.
He didn't say if you're adequate enough,
if you're charming enough.
No, he said follow me, and I,
I will make you fishers of men.
When you say, here am I, send me,
what will you do?
When you say, here am I, send me,
what will you do?
He said, I don't know anymore.
He said, I don't know what skills
you can do it like that.
He said, you'll make me fish.
You know what?
No, it's not for that.
If it's not for your own skill,
none of us can be fishing anymore.
Because we're all useless, really.
But praise God that he makes us
the fishers of men, right?
When you follow him,
when you put the effort in for him,
when you say, not I will,
but I'll be done.
That's what you need to be doing.
He makes you fishers of men.
And he didn't say he might, did he?
It says in verse 19, he said,
I'm going to follow me, and I will.
I will make you fishers of men.
And I believe that you're just
a part of people anyway.
Because he's given all of us the same job.
Everyone has been given the same job.
Take 2 Corinthians 5.
2 Corinthians 5.
It doesn't matter what your skills are,
what your past is.
If you're saved, you're a new creature.
2 Corinthians 5, verse 17 says this.
2 Corinthians 5, 17.
Therefore, if any man be in Christ,
he is a new creature.
Old things have passed away,
but all things have become new.
What does he say?
Does he say any sinless?
I say, I can do that.
Maybe not your strangest thoughts
are worse, aren't they?
Who cares?
You're a new creature now.
You have the ability to do that.
Maybe asking your old family member or friend
if they want to know how you're sure
they're going to heaven
would have made you up for,
I don't know, fishing out there
or anywhere else, he said.
Maybe it would have made you up
for something completely different.
Maybe that is something
that would really put the fear away.
Something where it's more scary
than the people you know,
that is, the strangest atmosphere, isn't it?
That's actually pretty terrifying, right?
It doesn't matter, this is your new creature.
If you're a new creature,
then you've got to do it.
Verse 18 says that
all things are of God
who have reconciled us
to himself by Jesus Christ
and has given to us
the ministry of reconciliation.
So the same us that was reconciled
is the same us that were given
the ministry of reconciliation, yeah?
Agreed?
You say, but I think anyone's saved.
No one's saved.
But look, to wit, that God was in Christ
reconciling the world unto himself,
not imputing their trespasses unto them
and have committed unto us
the word of reconciliation.
Doesn't that make a point, though?
It does, doesn't it?
It's the word of God that saves
and all you need to do is explain it.
And if you're saved,
you know what it says,
because you've got you saved.
You've got the word of God,
that's the word of God that saves.
That's why don't go out there
and start trying to re-word
the word of God.
Don't go out there and start trying to explain it
in your own words
and not even read the word of God.
When you're out there,
you need to preach the word of God.
Amen.
Now, yes, you need to explain
what that verse says,
but you need to make sure
you're reading the word of God.
Amen.
Verse 20 says now,
Then we are ambassadors for Christ,
and so God did beseech you by us.
We pray you in Christ, then,
be ye reconciled to God,
for he had made him to be sin for us,
who knew no sin that we might be made
for the righteousness of God.
I think it's the same us.
It's all the same us.
If you're saved, you're now a fisherman.
If you're saved, you're a fisherman,
so you may as well let him make you
a good rangerman.
You may as well not let them.
If you're saved, your job is to be done.
Now, you can choose to refuse that job.
Sure.
You can sit at home and get the welfare checks in.
It's up to you, right?
However, he's told you to go out and fish.
He wants you to follow him,
and if you get a fish,
you might as well do it
and be the best fisherman you can.
How do you do that?
Well, by you following him,
learning from him,
being around his people,
his fishing teams around the world,
he wants you to do it right.
He wants you to get it right.
So when do you start?
When do you start?
Well, is there a good time of year?
Is there a point in your life?
Well, Matthew 4.19 says this.
And he says unto them,
Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.
He said, Follow me, and I will make you fishermen.
They have to be great fishermen.
Fishing isn't automatic.
Fishing requires effort.
Fishing takes training.
Fishing is available to all fishing demands.
Number five, fishing demands urgency.
It says in verse 19, 7, I said,
Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.
And they straightway left their nets.
They didn't follow me.
They straightway left their nets.
They didn't go and think about it, did they?
They didn't go and mother told them about it.
They didn't put it off,
so they could indulge in their sin a little bit longer.
Jesus said, Follow me.
They straightway left their nets.
They left the dream job.
They left the focus on their career.
They left the stock thing at the gym.
They left the hours of hobbies, or whatever it is.
They left the endless hours of scrolling through social media
for no real apparent reason.
That stuff is a wicked addiction, still, isn't it?
I know this isn't a good story.
And I'll pull you in, right?
If you actually had that analyzed,
could you imagine how much time,
even in this room,
or even the touring people in this room,
are probably facing in their life,
just scrolling through Facebook,
or YouTube black holes,
or whatever the name of something.
Twitter, or what's that?
TikTok, all these teenagers with their hands up.
It's not the next one!
Not the next one!
But you know what?
They straightway left their nets.
They did it straightway to follow Jesus
to be a great fisherman for them.
Because here's the thing.
When Jesus is there saying, Follow me,
you don't want to let him get too far away.
No, he's saying, Follow me.
He's saying, Follow me.
I hope to death you're sitting in your one room,
maybe a bit in and out,
maybe that would be too much for somebody.
Maybe you've never done something.
Maybe you kind of got saved,
and I don't care for this.
I thought that was what we people did.
What about all the other churches doing it?
Because most of them are churches.
How are they churches?
They're not getting people saved.
How is it a church if they're not going out
and getting people saved?
And I'm behind in everything.
How is it a pastor, a leader of God's sheep,
if he isn't going out and getting people saved?
Some explain actually.
How am I leaving sheep to do what God wants us all to do?
What are you doing?
I'm a fool.
I'm a clown or I'm a lazy, lazy bum.
If you're a pastor, you need to go out and get your gospel.
If your pastor doesn't do that, you need to be wondering why.
Does he not believe the gospel gets you saved?
Perhaps.
Because if you know the gospel gets you saved,
why do you have that picture of the gospel to be a fool?
It's bizarre.
Is it?
Why do they not really believe?
They think, well, we need to get them in church really.
We need to get them in church and build them up
and let them turn away from all their sin
and give their life to Christ.
Oh, we're paying themselves to the gospel.
Yeah?
Well, no, he said, follow me.
They strayed what he left in their necks and followed him.
And when he's saying, hey, don't let him get followed,
don't go to chapter 20, where Jesus has been arrested
and Peter is following.
They all live from afar.
So Jesus has been arrested, Peter is following.
And verse 58 says this.
But Peter followed him afar off unto the high priest's palace
and went in and sat with the servants to see the end.
And what was the result of Peter following the far one?
And if you were thinking there in verse 58,
he said, Peter followed him afar off.
Instead of preaching boldly, instead of arguing
he's now upholding to make known the mystery of the gospel,
he denied it to some young girls.
That was the result of following afar off.
Verse 69, now Peter sat without him a palace and a damsel.
It's a young girl, came unto him saying,
no, sir, what's the Jesus going to do?
But he denied before them all.
He denied before them all, saying,
all right, what will thou say?
And when he was gone, he approached another babe.
He said, another young girl saw him
and said unto them that were there.
This fellow was also a Jesus now, sir,
and again he denied from them.
Oh, I do not know the man.
That ain't bonkers, right?
And after a while playing unto him later,
stood by and said to Peter, surely thou also art one of them,
that I speak to the ray of thee.
Then began he to curse and to swear,
saying, I know not the man, and immediately the cock crew,
and Peter remembered the word of Jesus,
which stood up to him before the cock cried thou shalt,
and I need Christ, and he went out and went bitterly.
Now that is no longer Peter's way.
What's the answer?
Following far off.
Following straight away.
Following straight away, but there's a link.
He followed him straight away.
And he drifted.
He just stayed close to Jesus.
Like I said earlier, that comes from the whole lot.
You need to follow him straight away.
We've got those lazy Sunday fishermen
relaxing all day with their mother.
I know some of these guys.
I know some of these fishermen.
They claimed they were off doing some small fishing.
Sitting there, usually booting,
chatting with their old buddy for a weekend,
telling their wife that, oh yeah,
I've just got to, you know, go and do some fishing.
Really, it's relax time, man time,
it's bunny time, you know?
And it's, I don't get it wrong,
if you're into fishing, obviously,
I was there for a week or so,
but if you're into fishing, cool, right?
But you've got to make sure you've got your
wife and wife as well.
Maybe for quite some time.
Maybe not again if the man needs to go
and spend the week.
Maybe just spend a few days sometimes of the day
fishing with their buddies, right?
But you've got to make sure you're doing the best.
You've got to make sure that you're loving your family.
You've got to make sure that you're
working for an Indian to provide for you.
You've got to make sure that you're serving God.
You've got to make sure that you're in church.
You've got to make sure that you're in solidarity.
You get all that out of the way,
you manage to fund this fishing.
But don't be like those lazy fishermen.
They said that they'd follow me,
and I would make them fish as a man,
and they straightaway left their necks
and followed me.
That would be a great fisherman, a fisherman.
Number one, fishing isn't automatic.
Number two, fishing requires effort.
Number three, fishing takes training.
Number four, fishing is available to all.
And number five, fishing demands urgency.
And look, anything on a mission is true, right?
There are souls to be won, aren't there?
There's a lot of souls to be won out there.
There are fishes to be called.
We need to get this, right?
I hope no one's going to drift off.
You know what my mother's book talked about when it
started?
I'm going to a fishing festival on Wednesday.
A lot of people start getting me off now, right?
I've got a few people saying, you know,
let's put our feet up now and start hanging around a bit.
Let's get busy, right?
We've got fish to catch.
You know what?
This is hectic, right?
Let's get some people saying,
but you know what?
Don't let the rest of you fish for life.
You need to make sure that you do the rest of it as well.
You want to do this for life, don't you?
I bet everyone here wants to fish for life,
and you need to take heed of this lesson.
Follow him.
Follow him equally.
If you've never fished before,
you won't hear it and you'll think,
well, I don't even know what happened,
but I just saw some people come in and saw it.
They'll come in and go, good.
Apparently, there's some sandwiches.
I don't know.
If that's you and you're thinking,
well, I don't really know much about all this fishing
and that stuff, you know what?
Come along.
We'll show you how to get things done.
We'll show you how to do this stuff.
And if you're sick and you think you can get a lot of that,
that's the NIV stuff.
You know something.
You know why it is the NIV stuff?
Because NIV churches,
they're trying to do things well.
We want to do what God tells us to do,
and he tells us to fish.
He tells us to get people safe.
He said, go in before the world,
preach the gospel to every preacher.
We're not doing it because we're trying to just be a bit
kind of out there or different or anything.
We're doing it because that's what churches should be doing.
That's what churches must be doing.
They're not doing that.
We want to move the candles here.
Get in the church.
It doesn't matter how big the word church is on the bill.
If they're not out there preaching the gospel,
they're not a church.
If you're wasting your time, in fact,
you're going to a social club.
You've got to go out and preach at a church.
A church has to send you out to preach the gospel.
That has to be really the number one ministry of a church.
Well, what are they even doing?
What are they doing?
And look, there are people here who support churches,
churches which are just out there preaching the gospel.
If you're not, you need to get into a church.
You need to find a way to have a situation
where you can have a church like that.
Because that's what it's all about.
That's what being a disciple is all about.
It's about getting out of people's safe.
It's about getting out of people's trust.
People are going to get saved.
All those people from the last few days have got saved.
None of them couldn't be saved if it wasn't
for all these people here going out,
with their vitals opening and how cold it is,
if they're out there listening to the gospel together.
They wouldn't be saved.
And that would be how many people still are here.
There's a chance that some of those people
might actually know the world and do the same thing.
And if none of you know better,
carry on going out and solving it.
How many of you can go out and do the same thing?
How many of you can get services
that can be affected by you deciding
I'm not going to sit upon any of them?
Or what's that going to do?
How many of you is that going to do?
But if I'm going to go out and solve this right next to me,
why don't you sit here thinking,
why don't you get out of here?
I want to get out of here.
I want to serve God.
So let's do it.
We've got a few more days of this.
We're going to get out there.
We're going to get a lot of people saying,
then after that, we'll continue.
And then he said, follow me,
and I won't let you finish the men.
It's straight away the Japanese.
Well, thank you for this great room for people.
Those people that are just here ready to
put a certain load down, get a machine.
And those here maybe that you've never done this before,
are wondering about this,
or maybe you're just kind of a bit unsure,
don't know where to start.
Lord Jesus, this is fine, please.
Look at all of us, everyone here,
it was a position before where they were saying,
and not so many.
And maybe it being a position where they were saying,
there's still not so many.
Having been so many before,
Lord, look, you know each and every one of us.
You know all of our pains, Lord.
You can work through that.
You can make this work.
You need this to be calculated.
There's not everyone here to say,
here, why, Lord, send me.
And then I always thought to just get out there
the rest of the suite,
in order to get more people safe,
and to inspire those who follow you.
Just bless us,
I hope to get home safe this evening.